The present invention relates to apparatus for use with a system of linked poker machines and in particular the apparatus provides an improved jackpot mechanism for use with such a poker machine system.
Many schemes have been devised in the past to induce players to play slot machines including schemes such as specifying periods during which jackpot prizes are increased or bonus jackpots paid. Other schemes involve awarding an additional prize to a first player to achieve a predetermined combination on a poker machine. These methods, while effective, add to club overheads because of the need for additional staff to ensure that the scheme is operated smoothly.
More recently, with the advent of poker machines linked through electrical networks it has been possible to automatically generate jackpot prizes on the basis of information received from the machines being played which are connected to the system and one such prior art arrangement, commonly known as “Cashcade™”, counts turnover on all machines in the network, increments a prize value in accordance with the turnover and pays the jackpot prize when the count reaches some predetermined and randomly selected number. In a more recent prior art arrangement, each game played on each machine in a gaming system is allocated a randomly selected number and the prize is awarded to a machine when the game number it is allocated matches a preselected random number.
In another recent prior art arrangement, the winning machine is selected by randomly selecting a number at a point in time and decrementing the number as games played on the system are counted until the number is decremented to zero at which time the game (or associated machine) causing the final decrement is awarded the jackpot.
With some prior art combination based trigger arrangements there is a serious disadvantage in that the player betting a single token per line, is just as likely to achieve a jackpot as the player playing multiple tokens per line. This has the effect of encouraging players playing for the bonus jackpot to bet in single tokens, rather than betting multiple tokens per game.
Jackpot games have traditionally been popular in Casinos. However, in their conventional format these games have inherent limitations:
(i) Games which use specific combinations of symbols to trigger jackpots are perceived by many players as being unwinnable. The games are typically designed in such a way that the big jackpots should not be won until large amounts are accumulated. With such low frequency the jackpots are never seen to be won by most players. Anecdotal evidence suggests that many players have learnt to disregard the chance of winning the major jackpots and are realistically playing for the lesser jackpots (i.e. the minor and mini jackpots). The increasing popularity of small mystery jackpots with higher frequencies of occurrence tends to support this argument;
(ii) Due to the increasing demand of players for a more complex and diverse game range, conventional jackpot games with combination triggers have become superseded. However, it is extremely complex to develop a wide variety of combinations which support both a feature game and mathematically exact jackpot triggers;
(iii) Typically, it would be expected that the game return (RTP) is independent of the number of coins bet per line. With conventional progressive jackpot games though, increasing the credits bet per line creates a relative disadvantage as far as RTP is concerned. Let's say the start-up amount for a feature jackpot is $10000. A player who is playing 1 credit per line has a chance for $10000 for each credit played, whereas a player playing 5 credits per line only has a chance for $2000 for each credit played. This creates a scale of diminishing returns. The smart player who gambles for the feature jackpot only, will always cover all playlines, but will only bet 1 credit per line because the prize paid for the feature jackpot is the same irrespective of the bet. This is supported by data collected from casinos;
(iv) Typical combination triggered progressive jackpots have fixed hit rates which removes from the operator's control the ability to vary jackpot frequency.
These arrangements have been in use in the State of New South Wales and in other jurisdictions for a considerable period of time, however, as with other aspects of slot machine games, players become bored with such arrangements and new and more innovative schemes become necessary in order to stimulate player interest.
In this specification, the term “combinations” will be used to refer to the mathematical definition of a particular game. That is to say, the combinations of a game are the probabilities of each possible outcome for that game.